Wednesday, April 30, 2014

April 28, 2014

WOW. What a week! This has been an awesome week. SO much happened. I don't even know where to start. New investigator, Mission Tour with Elder Whiting, Fireside with Seoul South Mission and Sister Burton and Sister Oscarson, transfer calls and so many miracles!

1. Investigators- we have a new investigator! Her name is 최 (Choi) For some reason she only tells us that part of her name.... which is actually her last name.. so we call her sister Choi. whatevs. she does what she wants. haha anyways, we met her last week while we were out on the streets talking to people. She was super nice and really interested in what we were sharing. We told her a little bit about our message and she said she would like to meet with us. We actually met with her twice this week. The first time we met with her was interesting. We taught her about the Book of Mormon and the Restoration. Somehow she started asking us all these questions about the parables and the meanings of all of them and she wanted us to explain the meaning of all of them. She had tons of questions about random things in the Bible and was bothered that we are missionaries and didn't know the answers to all of them. We tried to steer it back to the Book of Mormon and the Restoration and told her that we are only 20 years old and we don't know the answers to all of your questions, but we were called by a prophet of God and we know that our message is true. The spirit was strong as we bore testimony of the restored gospel and of the Book of Mormon. I asked her if she would read and pray about the Book of Mormon and her response was straight up NO. So that was frustrating. BUT she wanted to meet with us again. So we met with her a few days later. This time we brought our ward mission leader with us. (HE IS AWESOME) and he helped us with the lesson. He helped us teach the Apostasy a little more clear and she understood everything. She said it all makes sense. She wants to meet again with us, so that's a miracle. She still isn't willing to read or pray yet, but she is starting to be more open to everything we are teaching her because the need for a restoragion is beginning to make sense to her. YAY. love her. she's awesome!

Remember 이버영 (Ee Bo)??? She actually texted us back this week. MIRACLE. She hasn't responded to our texts in like a month and a half. She told us she has been super busy and that she would like to meet with us after her tests are done this week. PLEASE.

Today 김학연 ( Kim, one of our former investigators) texted us and asked us if she could meet today. At 5. It's P-Day for us, but we are super happy that she said that so of course we are meeting with her! yea!!

2. Last week Elder Whiting and His wife came for a mission tour. On friday my zone combined with 2 or 3 other zones had a zone conference type thing. It was SO good. I learned SO much. I realize that there are so many ways I can improve. He talked about how Nehpi was "highly favored of the Lord" and how we can be highly favored of the Lord through righteousness. We talked about ways Nephi was righteous and how we can be like him. President talked to us about receiving the Holy Ghost and things we can do DAILY to receive the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is the POWER that accompanies the authority we are given as missionaries. It was awesome.

3. On Saturday night we were able to attend a fireside in the Seoul South mission. The general relief society and general YW presidents came. Sister Burton and Sister Oscarson, along with President Ringwood who is over our area. It was so good! They talked about the things we can do in our families to be strong. Sister Burton talked about the song "one more day" and about the ship accident that happened here in Korea. So many lives were lost. She talked about spending each day with our families as if it were our last. What are the things we would do if it were our last day together? She talked about those things and the most important things like scripture and prayer... etc. She said those things are the things that will prepare us for tragedies and give us strength. It was awesome. President Ringwood talked about Member-missionary work and he said to the people Member missionary work is so important to HF. I can show you how important it is to HF." He had all the missionaries stand and sing called to serve and then he said that is how important it is to HF. he called every one of these missionaries to Korea to help you. it was an awesome talk. The whole meeting was awesome. It was SO fun seeing all of my friends from Seoul South mision!!!! I love them. Afterwards, Sister Burton's husband came up and talked to me. I told him I think he knows my uncle, Mark Millburn and he was like oh my gosh! yes! Sister Burton came up and gave me a huge hug. They said they would tell Mark and Maylene Hi from me! We talked to them for a few minutes and they were super nice :)

4. Transfer calls!! Transfer calls were the same night as the fireside, so sister Koo and I walked up to talk to president and sister christensen and he told us right then where we were going. Sister Koo is being transferred to a new area :'( and I am staying. I guess I will have to hold the fort up in WonDang! I think I know my way around by now though. By new comp is full Korean but she is from Highland Utah. She didn't know Korean before her mission because she grew up in America. She has been out for like 8 months or something. I'm excited to meet her. Sad that Sis Koo is leaving though! :(

5. SO many small miracles this week! So President told the missionaries to invite any people we could to the fireside and to try to bring someone with us, but if we couldn't find anyone, we could still come. So we made a list of about 18 people on it. Less active members, investigators, potential investigators, etc. And we called every single one of them. None of them said they could or would come. After we called the last person, I said is there ANYONE else that we could invite? And Sister Koo remembered one less active who has been having some issues and won't come to church and is struggling a bit. She wasn't sure if we should call her or not, becasue things can be a little tricky with her sometime. But i thought we should. So we called her and she said YES! She would come. She was really happy that we invited her and i think she really needed it. She came with us and I think she really enjoyed the fireside. Miracle!

Another miracle. Yesterday I was out street contacting and I was talking to this lady. She was catholic and she didn't really want to hear my message. I was about to offer her a Book of Mormon, but then i felt like i should wait a second to give it to her. ( we were walking down the street while talking) a few minutes later I testified of the BoM, offered it to her and then she left. Right after that, I turned around to head back and Someone called me over to them. It was a guy who had been standing close by right when I offered this lady the BOM. He said "Hey! I want that book!!" So we went over and told him about our message. He told us he had seen us and that he wanted to know what we are sharing. We gave him the BoM and our card and he said he would read it. We are going to go back to his little store he works at and follow up with that. There are so many small miracles that happen each day. It's incredible.

Well, I better run. I am so thankful to be here in Korea! I love this gospel so much. This week I have been thinking a lot about the resurrection and how thankful I am for Christ. I have been studying Jesus The Christ and I've learned so much about the Savior after he was resurrected. I am so thankful for the chance to share the gospel. I love it more than anything. Have a great week!!! Love you!